Ambush (Michael Bennett #11)(32)



“I saw an article in the paper,” I said. “The case is yours?”

“Most everyone is on deck for this.” He put both hands back on the wheel. “A lot of footwork involved. Lead is a detective named Bill Gorman.”

Gorman and I had worked together briefly on a theft case before he moved to Major Crimes.

“He’s a low-hanging fruit kind of guy,” I said. “Or did I miss something?”

Cohen stayed silent as he merged with the westbound traffic on the interstate. It was answer enough.

“How’d he get the assignment?”

“He was up in the rotation.”

I stared out the windshield. I was pissed, but in truth, a lazy or lousy cop made my task less difficult. He was likely to let me work on angles and not ask too many questions. The fact that Cohen was only peripherally on the case made it both easier and harder. Easier because I wouldn’t have to keep him embroiled. Harder since I also wouldn’t have access to much information. Cohen often shared his cases with me because, as he generously put it, my view of the world was warped.

Sometimes I fit perfectly.

He took the I-25 ramp heading north, then exited at Hampden and turned west. In the back seat, Clyde lay down. But he kept his head on the console, and I continued to rub his ears. As always, his company was a solace. I figured he felt the same way about me.

That’s what it means to have a war buddy. No one gets it like those who’ve been there.

I wondered if Cohen could understand what I was about to share. He’d hunted gangbangers, gone undercover with drug dealers, and as a murder cop, he’d peered into the darkest recesses of the human soul.

But he’d never been to my kind of war.



Michael Walker Cohen lived in Cherry Hills, a neighborhood where the houses cost more than what I’d make putting in forty years on the job. My first glimpse of the place had made me feel like I’d landed on Mars. I’d warned myself not to get involved with a man who could start and finish each day in a bubble so rarified it almost demanded its own supply of oxygen.

But when I learned it was family money and he was every bit as uncomfortable with it as I was, I overcame my hesitation. Now, well . . . I couldn’t say I hated it. The manicured grounds, the gourmet kitchen, the fact that no matter how much junk you had, there was a cupboard for it—it added up to something. Plus, Clyde seemed to prefer trees over fire hydrants. Cohen’s deceased grandmother’s library—which ran to history books and noir mysteries—along with a wine cellar that held mostly whiskey stored upright in glass cases like museum specimens . . . these things helped ease the transition.

So far, I’d worked my way from Ken Bruen to James Cain and, with Cohen’s help, through most of a bottle of Ardbeg Renaissance.

The money also told me what made Cohen such a great detective—he was motivated by his sense of justice, not a pension.

That counted for a lot.

The family mansion loomed before us, our headlights illuminating gables and flashing off leaded glass windows. His grandmother—the only other Cohen to venture west of the Mississippi—had lived in the house until her death. Now, the only people going in and out were the cleaning staff.

Cohen lived in the carriage house out back.

As he took the curve around the manor and approached the carriage-house driveway, the headlights caught a small security sign planted near the stairs to the front door.

I raised an eyebrow. “That’s new.”

Cohen shrugged self-consciously. “Had a break-in the day you left.”

A ghostly hand pressed fingers to my neck. I forced my voice to remain casual. “Here in the land of entry-coded gates and a roving security force? You’ve destroyed my faith.”

The garage door sensed his vehicle and opened obligingly. Welcome home, sir.

He said, “The insurance guys told me they’d keep my rates down if I bought into a security service. Makes sense. But it’s embarrassing as hell for a cop. Anyway, I wrote the security code down for you. It’s by the phone in the kitchen.”

“They take anything?”

“Not as far as I could tell.”

“So how did you know—?”

“They left a calling card.”

A ragged thread in his voice made me sit up. “What kind of card?”

“Sydney—”

“Tell me.”

“They left a dog in the house.”

“A dog?”

“Not a live one.”

That shut me down. My hand reached back for Clyde, and I buried my fingers in his fur.

“Looked like a pooch they found on the street,” Cohen said. “Thin and filthy. Someone strangled it. My top suspect is a guy I put away for robbery who just got paroled. A piece of work, that one. Started every job by shooting the pets. His PO is following up with him. In the meantime, I changed the locks and hired the security service.”

“Where did he leave the dog?”

Cohen’s eyes flicked to Clyde. “Doesn’t matter. I took care of it.”

We got out of the vehicle, and Clyde and I followed Cohen up the stairs. Once inside, the first thing I noticed was Clyde’s new bed in the living room. I raised an eyebrow.

“That’s where the dead dog was?”

An elaborately casual shrug. “Clyde needed a new bed anyway.”

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